to wonder how DH holds down a very serious, grown up job when he is so utterly incompetent

[OhdearNigel]

DH is a detective sergeant. He holds people's liberty in his hand, controls rape investigations and takes control of murder scenes. He has had to give evidence about finding bodies that have been searched for months. He keeps control on dozens of serious investigations at any one time and manages a small team of experienced detectives.

With this in mind, you would imagine that, having told him last week "can you ring your mates and tell them DD's birthday party is postponed until the same time, same place next Sunday" that I would not have just had the following conversation:

DH " Did you phone Steve and Mich and Mike and Lucy, T & V and Brian & Margaret to tell them that the party is tomorrow"

Me "No. I asked you to do that"

DH "I assumed you were doing it"

Me "Why would you think that when they are your friends and you know perfectly well I don't have their phone numbers. And why did you not just tell them when you phoned to tell them it was postponed. Jeez, you really could not organise a piss up in a brewery"

AIBU to wonder how the fuck anyone in senior management trusts my DH to manage a bag of Safer Neighbourhoods stickers, let alone a murder ?

Quite often when people hold down strong responsbility in a job, they are unable to handle simple tasks outside of that job. I can be like that at times and DH just laughs at me :-)

I used to work with detectives. They cocked up frequently, including the murder investiations.

Sorry.

My DH is similar. Holds a senior operations job keeping large swathes of the broadband network running. Ask him to do something small and DC related and it all goes tits up.

I feel your pain OP

DH is a head of department in a very successful and prestigious private school.

Total fuckwit at home.

I wouldn't mind if he would just put his hands up to it being his cockup, not mine. It's the attempt at palming the blame onto me that hacks me off

He probably, genuinely, remember being asked or agreeing to do it. Go easy on him, he gets a hard time at work.

we work the same amount of hours a week, I also have a difficult and emotionally demanding job supporting victims going to court. Today I have been dealing with a victim of several years of rape by her uncle and two different victims of domestic violence. but I've had to come home this evening and think about birthday parties, the washing, who is having what for their packed lunch tomorrow and how DD is going to get to where she has to be. If I can do it there is no reason DH cannot just because he has a penis

Your DH has probably secretaries and underlings to keep reminding him of the things he has to do whilst at work ....

and he was in the middle of 3 days off when the party was postponed so not being hassled to deal with it in the middle of worktime

he wishes dikkert

Sounds like me! I manage a lot of people at work, high pressure but not much paperworky serious stuff... my job is basically to make sure they are doing their jobs. I'm a bit dippy with an awful lot of things but my team keep me right most of the time!

Don't coppers do text messages or is that too low-tech?

I often wonder how DH manages to fly around the world, negotiate several timezones, hold important meetings and juggle a Blackberry, IPad and laptop, but apears to be incapable of switching on the washing machine.

It has long been my opinion that the more important the job outside the house, the more fuckwitted some men can be inside it.

This is all very reassuring.

Although my job isn't very important and I still manage to be a bit of a domestic fuckwit.

DH is the same. He's a senior director for a large organisation, and can frequently be found standing in front of the hob, staring at it as though it's the Hadron collider, and then turning to me, saying, "Which knob turns the back one on?"

I despair.

Mine was previously shuffling about millions of pounds in budgets, but has taken redundancy now - and he cooked a WHOLE dinner tonight! Still tried to coax me in to make the coleslaw though...

If my theory is correct you can look forward to some brain action when he retires...

My job goes up and down with the amount of mental input required, and I can definitely feel my at-home-competency going down when it has to go up at work. Limited supply of sense I guess!

The simpler the task the more useless my DH becomes.
I'm certain he could design a functioning nuclear bomb, but he can't remember to empty the washer.

Ditto. Can run a nuclear power station but not a washing machine.
So glad I'm not alone in my predicament...

My dad was a diplomat (first secretary) for 25 years, but couldn't boil an egg or organise household paperwork.

Doing his tax return every year after he retired made him ill with stress. Even though he hardly paid any tax because he had very little money.

Bless him.

Behind every successful woman is a man asking "where are my socks?"
And behind every successful man is a woman/or other, doing the same or not, or sacrificing some time. The moral of the story? Live a little, give a little.

Me too TeamEdward